Should partisan ideology be promoted by public schools?

If your politics was Democrat; you voted regularly for Democrat Party candidates; and believed in the Democrat Party platform; how would you like it if the public school your child attended promoted and taught Republican Party ideology and politics in your kid’s classroom? What would you think if the school teachers and administrators put up Donald Trump posters in all the classrooms and common areas at your child’s school?

If your politics was Republican, and you wanted to impart that ideology to your children, what would you think if your kid’s public school promoted Hillary Clinton for President? The answer is easy. You wouldn’t like it. You would probably be inclined to complain about it. And your reason would be that the public schools have no legitimate business promoting partisan ideology to the children; especially as they are forced by law to attend.

By the same token, if your religion was Christian; you believed in Christianity; and wanted your children to believe in it too; how would you feel if  the public school your child attends started  promoting and teaching a different religion or no religion at all to your kid in the classrooms, the assembly’s and common areas of the school building?

Again, I think you wouldn’t like it. I think you would be inclined to complain; and your reason would be the same -- the public schools have no legitimate business promoting partisan ideology to the children; especially as they are forced by law to attend.

And you would be absolutely right. Partisan ideology, whether it be political, religious or cultural, has no rightful place in the learning curriculums of public schools. Parents and children should not be forced to participate in schools which promote partisan values.  

I don’t believe that the government authority should be involved at all in the education of children. I think that is unconstitutional. In a free country education should be the sole responsibility of the parents, the individual and the family.

But if there must be public schools, and if otherwise free individuals can be forced to participate in them, surely the only legitimate purpose is to teach the kids how to read, write, figure and assimilate peacefully with their peers. Once that educational goal is accomplished each child is fully equipped to pursue his or her life, liberty and happiness in society. Politics, religion, and all other cultural values can easily be learned and practiced at home and after the children leave their public school.

People who believe that public schools should be employed to promote partisan values – typically Christianity -- to hapless conscripted children make me angry.  They never stop trying even after their efforts are struck down by the courts. They whine and cry pitifully when a “School district boots Jesus Christ, a prayer and a hymn” from the educational curriculum. They really think that our government should take sides in matters of partisan religion. They want the public schools to teach all the kids Christianity.

“Jesus Christ is no longer welcome at a school district in Tipton, Missouri. And neither are prayers or a religious hymn,” they lament. “The Tipton R-VI School District decided to cleanse itself of anything remotely affiliated with Christianity after they were bullied by the Freedom From Religion Foundation. They even pulled down a giant portrait of our Lord that was displayed in the grade school’s library.”

 Well, of course the school district only did what the law required it do. That’s because sponsoring, promoting and teaching any partisan religion ideology in public schools plainly violates the United States Constitution – it’s patently unconstitutional.

So stop your whining. You know that if the shoe were on the other foot you would be demanding that the school follow the same law. You would be demanding that no partisan ideology should be promoted by public schools.